Sunday, 8 September 2013

DIY: Melted Crayon Art

This is my favorite art craft I've ever stumbled upon. You've probably seem numerous amounts of these babies on Pinterest & Etsy & Tumblr, and everywhere else. They are gorgeous, so much fun, easy to do, and the variations are infinite. I've heard of a few ways of doing these but my most favorite are with a blowdryer, and a glue gun. Yes a glue gun. I can't warrant that your glue gun would even survive after shoving crayons through it, but it's quicker and you can have more fun with it, so I will be showing you both ways to do this :)

MATERIALS

pack of crayons (ANY size you want) you could even go big and do the 94 pack

blow dryer

canvas (any size will do really but the best is to use a 16x13 pre-painted canvas, you can get them at any dollar tree store for 1-2$, so grab a handful

a hot glue gun, and newspaper, LOTS of newspaper as it will probably get a bit if not VERY messy at times

STEP 1 - Sort Your Crayons

Sort out your crayons depending on what you want. The rainbow is a very popular and most easiest design, just place the crayons in the order of the rainbow. You can go darkest to lightest, or lightest to darkest, or others use different shades of the same color.

STEP 2 - Glue your crayons to your canvas

Take a crayon on at a time and glue them onto the canvas, tips facing down. Put the crayons above the canvas first though to make sure you have enough to fit across the top of the canvas before gluing as once they are stuck on, trust me, they won't be coming off easily haha.

This should be what it looks like with the crayons glued onto the canvas. Now for the fun part

STEP 3 - Melt your crayons
This is the most time consuming step, as it can take anywhere from 5 - 8 minutes to actually melt each small section of crayon. Make sure your canvas is propped up against something like a wall, so the crayon will drip down the canvas, and double make sure your work surface is protected accordingly. Work in small sections and hold the blow dryer about 12" away from the canvas. It'll take a couple minutes for the crayons to actually start melting.

I've also heard of people using a heat gun as it produces a hotter air and it doesn't splatter it as much as using a hair dryer does.

STEP 4: Let It Dry

Once you've finished (should take around 45 minutes - 60 minutes depending on the size of your canvas and your particular design you've chosen. Let it dry 100% and then scrape off the excess dried crayon on the bottom of the canvas.

VOILA! your project is complete, and you can hang it in any room of the house as it is a great focal point and gives you an opportunity to boost about how you did it yourself :D

Tips & Tricks For Making The Best Of Your Melted Crayon Art Experiance

TIP #1 : Acquire a decent amount of crayons. Nothings more annoying then buying a 64 pack of crayons, getting home, realizing your short crayons, and have to go back and pick up another. BULK UP!

TIP #2: Remove all the dark dingy colors (unless they are incorporated into your design). So take out all the blacks & browns & grays, and go for happier colors like bright purple, green, and yellow :)
TIP #3: The rainbow layout is the best, and most fun as you can do the ROYGBIV layout, or use all of the same color but different shades.
TIP #4: Using the lower heat setting on your hair dryer is the best approach as using the highest heat setting can cause more splattering of the wax than you really wanted to. Try not to wave your hair dryer back and forth as this will cause more splattering and direct your wax everywhere you don't want it to go. Also doing this outside is a great idea too cause then you can get wax everywhere and nobody cares :D

TIP #5: When the wax starts to drip down and you remove the heat from it, the crayon does trail down quickly, and if you don't like how they are thin then you can go over the crayon and melt it again for a more three dimensional look and keep doing this till your satisfied :)